Last week’s ground-breaking settlements between U.S. bank regulators and many of the top mortgage servicers in the country may bring some certainty to the industry about the ultimate resolution of the foreclosure crisis still gripping parts of the nation, but it’s also likely to lead to higher costs and more labor-intensive compliance efforts, according to a consensus of industry analysts...

Some imprecise language in last year’s financial reform legislation has thrust the Federal Reserve into a quandary on how best to define “qualified mortgage” under the new law, according to some top industry lawyers and market analysts...

Bank executives expect it will be a tall order for their firms to address the various tax implications of the Dodd-Frank Act, as well as the Basel III liquidity standards, particularly with regard to securitizations, according to a recent survey by audit, tax and advisory firm KPMG. KPMG reported that 48 percent of respondents said their firms were still trying to figure out the tax implications of Dodd-Frank and Basel III, while 49 percent said...

Although federal regulators this week gave the industry more time to comment on their controversial proposal on risk retention in non-agency MBS and ABS transactions, some industry experts have already suggested that the concept fails to address its fundamental purpose of strengthening deal quality by aligning the interests of securitizers and investors. Risk retention is an intellectually appealing idea, but it’s not clear that it provides...

Consumer and civil rights groups are up in arms over the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s recent interpretation of preemption under the Dodd-Frank Act, which would allow the OCC to generally retain its existing preemption regulations. The uproar stemmed from a letter the OCC sent to certain members of Congress on May 12 lay-ing out the agency’s views of its preemption powers under the new preemption provisions of Title X of the Dodd-Frank Act. Those views have been embodied in a proposed OCC rulemaking implementing several DFA provisions, including...

Weichert Financial/Mortgage Access Corp., an agency/jumbo mortgage lender in 43 states, reached a settlement with the banking regulators of 10 states after a multi-state examination found numerous compliance and internal control deficiencies, including the use of an “interstate lending desk” to facilitate the origination or completion of mortgage applications by originators that were not licensed in the appropriate jurisdictions. “The multi-state mortgage examination program was initiated to enhance consumer protection, foster a culture of compliance within the industry, and hold...

The Congressional Budget Office is recommending changes in how the government accounts for programs that dominate the residential mortgage market, which could make the FHA program less at-tractive, politically, and shape the post-Fannie/Freddie market. In a pair of recent reports, the CBO said the government should adopt fair-value accounting for assessing the cost of the FHA, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in the federal budget. Congress currently uses special rules mandated by the Federal Credit Reform Act of 1990 in creating annual budgets for the FHA, while the government-sponsored enterprises are...

Illinois. A federal grand jury has indicted three partners in a failed Chicago North Shore development project, a title company executive and a loan officer for allegedly engaging in a $15.7 million residential mortgage and construction loan fraud scheme to help finance the failed mixed-use commercial development known as the Center of the Northshore. The government accuses

Office of the Comptroller of the CurrencyFederal Reserve SystemFederal Deposit Insurance Corp.Securities and Exchange CommissionFederal Housing Finance AgencyDepartment of Housing and Urban Development Credit Risk Retention – Proposed Rule: Comments Due. Public comments on the interagency proposed rule on credit risk retention are due June 10, 2011. (See...